Title: Branding
I'm a ranch hand on a big spread. I like it most of the time, riding the open range, keeping an eye on the great herds. They're all colors; whites, blacks, reds, even the odd creamy one. But the one time of year I could do without is branding. The round-up isn't the bad part, it's the bawling, kicking and the stink of burning hide. But the herds got to go to market and they can't do that if there isn't any brand on them.
It's a long process. First we have to bring in a herd from the fields. All those mommas and their kids bawling back and forth to each other. You got to watch them, if one gets it in their head to take off on you, pretty soon the whole works are stampeding in the wrong direction. Then once we get them in the pens then the real rodeo starts.
The mommas are big beasts, darn near as tall as my chest when I'm standing on the ground. The little ones only come up to about my waist. Next comes lots of running around and swearing as us hand try to split them up, with mommas going into one pen and little ones in another. Once that's done then we got to get started on the real work.
I'm on the back end, in charge of running the young ones up the chute one at a time. You have to watch, they're slippery little fellows. How some of them get turned around in that narrow alley and come charging back at you I'll never know. Best way to handle them is just get right up behind them and just push them along you get to the chute. If you're too far away they sometimes kick out at you. Boy that smarts if they connect. Then every single one of them sees that opening in front of them and makes a mad dash, only to get their heads caught as they push the gate shut on themselves. The hands on the chute have to act quickly and squeeze the sides of the chute tight before the little fellow hurts himself or something.
Now I get a bit of a break. There are 3 hands by the chute to get everything done a bit faster. One of them puts the tattoo on the ear, which always gets a bawl. The second hand gives the shot of antibiotics into the meat of the shoulder. Sometimes that gets a bawl too. The third hand has to take the heated iron and sear in the brand along the ribs. Boy does that cause a ruckus, bawling, jumping and squirming. It's picked up by all the rest, adding to the din. The smell of cooked meat wafts my direction as I head back to get another one and they let the first one loose.
Good thing these humans reproduce so easily, they sure take a long time to grow into anything.